


Preconceived Notions

by Dana



Series: Beliefs [1]
Category: Life on Mars (UK)
Genre: Bittersweet, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-13
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-03-22 21:57:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3744871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dana/pseuds/Dana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some thoughts about Sam, and Gene, and Gene's bed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Preconceived Notions

**Author's Note:**

> I've been having a bad week and it culminated in me needing to write some massive ~~bittersweet and angsty~~ OTP fluff.

It's novel, definitely a new experience, sleeping in Gene Hunt's bed. It's the dozenth time it's happened now, give or take, and Sam still hasn't quite grown accustomed to it – maybe he never will. It's a nicer bed than the one back in his flat, if he could even call that thing a bed: and while it's nothing compared to the one he left in 2006, he's not going to complain.

There's a few things he _has_ grown accustomed to, when it comes to Gene's bed: when he sees it that means that he and Gene are going to have sex, there's no denying that. The sort depends on what kind of day they've had, just how tired they are at the end of it, of each other and of everything else. The nights where they're more angry at the world than they are at each other, those are the nights where they hardly make it up the stairs, so the bed plays no direct part in what happens, except for what follows after. The ones where they're too tired to even think of what the word 'sex' means, that's a completely different affair. They still get off, but it's less of an event than it might have been, if they were angrier, if they had more energy. A place for everything, and everything in its place. It doesn't always have to happen with a bang.

Sam tends to be the one who gets up after it's been said and done, wanders to the bathroom to fetch a wet flannel to clean them off. If it's cold enough, they worry about putting their pyjamas on, and if it's not, they don't. Either way, Gene flops out on his back and is asleep within minutes, snoring loudly. Sam chucks the cloth across the room, if he hadn't already, and curls up on his side of the bed, his back to Gene, both of them tucked beneath the covers.

He really isn't a girl, but sex is an emotional connection whether Gene wants it to be or not, and sometimes afterwards he'd really like for Gene to hold him, or for Gene to just let Sam hold _him_. Especially when he's been cut open and bled dry of everything else, when his eyes ache and sting – he isn't going to cry, he really just needs to _sleep_.

Sleep... it catches up to him eventually, but never overtakes him as effortlessly as it does Gene. No, not with the backdrop of Gene's snoring, plus Sam's own inability to shut his mind off: no, he thinks about nothing, and he thinks about it some more, and time trickles down but never quite runs out, and all along Sam envies Gene's ability to just shut it all _off_. More often than not, he's woke at about two in the morning, groggy and confused – not that he can really see the time on the clock, but it feels like it can't be any later than three – with Gene growling at him: 'Bloody hell, don't you ever shut up? Gladys, just... just go back to bloody sleep.'

But even that isn't a constant. Sometimes, when he wakes up, it's not Gene's annoyance that greats him, but softly slurred words instead, the light brush of a hand. 'Go back to sleep, love,' he might say, voice close but his body still miles away, across the stretch of the bed. 'You're safe now, bastards can't get at you, go back to sleep.'

As groggy and confused as he might have been any other night, Sam always does as he's been told. He goes back to sleep thinking that Gene wanted to do more than just comfort him with absent words, the stray touch of his fingers brushing at Sam's shoulder. He'd wanted to move closer, Sam's sure he had. He forgets that too, once sleep gets in the way, at least until it's all over and done with, and Sam is more awake.

Morning comes, one way or another, and Sam doesn't remember the specifics of the nightmare, but knows it had to be bad – does Gene still think it's just a way for Sam's guilty conscious to make itself be heard? Sam doesn't know, and Gene doesn't say. It's probably better that way. They're back on their own sides of the bed, after all, that invisible wall that exists between them standing tall and mighty. It's sex and nothing more that's put Sam in this position, and Gene just happens to not mind it, Sam sleeping in his bed. In fact, Sam's probably only there just so Gene has ready access to a morning after shag.

All his expectations and worries get blown out of the water on those few, rare days, when he wakes up with Gene wrapped around him, breath warm against the back of Sam's neck, arms heavy and secure about his chest and waist. It leaves him feeling safe in a way he's not felt in years, and needed in a way that none of his other relationships ever quite managed. There's a point where he knows Gene's gone and woken up, but neither of them are ready for the illusion to be dispelled: Sam doesn't say anything, and Gene doesn't move, and they simply lie there together, breathing. It's tranquil, the sunlight pale and the day hardly started, Gene's body flush against his own. He feels vulnerable and knows that, when Gene shivers against him, he must feel the same way.

Sex coupled with violence might be one thing and Gene handles that combination like a professional. Tender embraces and meaningful silences are clearly too much. It happens two ways, with no deviation: the morning after shag happens, or it doesn't, and if it does it borders on brutal. Either way, afterwards Gene gets up to start the day, Sam wincing as follows: at the twinge of soreness that will no doubt follow him through the day, at the flask of whisky Gene kept in his bedside stand.

Sometimes, and he prefers those days without a doubt, they go back to sleep instead of giving in and getting up, with Sam first turning over and shifting about in Gene's arms so they're left face to face. The morning after shag still tends to happen, further along down the line, but it defies all preconceived notions about what it's like to have sex with Gene Hunt.

No, on those mornings, they _make love_ , and admitting that to himself means Sam's finally gone absolutely insane.

Still, he knows that those mornings where they linger a while are the best mornings of them all, and cherishes them like the rare treasures they are.


End file.
